The Oilers are losing because they too often do too many of the little things incorrectly, team captain Andrew Ference told hockey journalist Jason Gregor at Oilers Nation this week.

Ference could not have been more correct about what ails the Oilers, a team full of marvellously skilled hockey players, who evidently spent the formative years of their hockey careers with the puck on their sticks, but in many cases failed to learn and commit to defensive fundamentals.

Now they are playing catch up at the NHL level. It’s not always pretty, even if the players are keen to play better defensive hockey. Changing engrained habits is no easy matter.

Here’s what Ference told Gregor on the issue of the little things.

“If you look across the league, any team that has been consistently good for the last few years they all have a consistent compete level, a real desire to defend and get the puck back. Those little things aren’t the highlights of the night, but they are the foundation of the game. The good teams have a consistent dedication to those details.

“Winning teams are full of players that really understand the importance of those small details. It’s not a secret.”

“Failing to do these little things is not acceptable,Ference said. “It can’t be acceptable in the room, but most importantly it can’t be acceptable to the player himself. It is a very philosophical thing. You want to have a room full of guys that aren’t doing those little details because the coach tells them to. They are doing it because they want to, and they know that it helps everybody.

“Everybody can learn. That is the one thing everyone can do, but it takes a lot of commitment.”

Little things gone wrong vs. Toronto. . .

Case in point, the Oilers 4 to 0 loss to Toronto this week.

When the game was still on the line, Toronto out-chanced Edmonton 15 to 10. Even worse, ten of Toronto’s scoring chances were Grade ‘A’ chances, while just five of the Oilers chances were Grade ‘A,’ shots where the shooter had the opportunity from close in to drain it.

Why did Edmonton give up so many more Grade ‘A’ chances? The little things.

Here are a few examples of how I saw it:

Early in the first, Anton Belov pinches. He’s not supposed to pinch unless he can see a forward covering for him. Oilers winger Nail Yakupov is there, but for the briefest of seconds, instead of being in “cover” mode, Yakupov watches the puck, allowing Toronto’s Phil Kessel to get a step on him. Kessel eventually gets a breakaway pass to score.

A few minutes later, Oilers centre Boyd Gordon decides to chase Jake Gardiner, who has full possession of the puck, in behind the Leafs net. Gardiner beats him out the other side, and now the ice is open to him, allowing him to build speed up. Instead of having Gordon there to slow him, push him to the boards, Gardiner enters the Oilers zone at full speed, causing havoc. He passes it out to Joffey Lupul, Belov’s coverage in the slot is a bit loose, and Lupul has two Grade ‘A’ shots at scoring.

A bit more than a minute left in the first, Gordon rushes out to get at the pointman on the power play, even though the pointman has full control of the puck. The Toronto attacker simply passes it down to the half-wall, opening up a dangerous shot in the slot that leads to two more quick chances against the Oilers.

Aggressive penalty kill work or over-aggressive work? Whatever it was, it didn’t work.

Early in the second, even though Toronto has full control of the puck in the neutral zone, three Oilers forwards, Ryan Nugent-Hopkins, Ales Hemsky and Ryan Jones, switch off the ice, giving Toronto the space and time to ignite an attack ending in a dangerous scoring chance.

A few moments later, Yakupov fails to make the simple play in the Oilers zone on the boards, overhandles the puck, is stripped of it, and Toronto gets a chance.

Moments after that, Schultz moves into the Toronto slot and rings one of the post. Toronto picks up the rebound and is off to the races with an odd man rush. Schultz, Yakupov, Jordan Eberle and Sam Gagner are all down low, but Gagner hustles back, only to run out of gas at the last moment and stop moving his legs, allowing his man to score. Belov, meanwhile, fails to stop the pass over on the two-on-one.

At 16:18 of the second, Jones coughs up the puck in the Oilers end and it leads to a scoring chance against.

Around the 11:30 mark of the second, Eberle and Gagner get their signals crossed about who is helping the d-men down low in the Oilers zone. Neither covers Phil Kessel, who gets a rebound off the end boards and scores.

At 15:19 of the third, Justin Schultz again moves into the slot trying to score — a good move considering the Oilers are down — but again Eberle and Gagner don’t cover for him and Belov fails to prevent the pass across on the two-on-one. Toronto gets another great chance.

Finally, Toronto ices the game around the 13:50 mark of the third, after Jeff Petry makes a sloppy pass that leads to a Grade ‘A’ scoring chance and a goal against.

Many of these mistakes were small ones. Hardly any of them were horrible and glaring. But if the Oilers are going to win, so many little mistakes simply can’t keep happening.

It’s time to eliminate the Little Killers,but easier said than done, not until the attitude that defence comes first is embraced by all.

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